Cookery and Dining in Imperial Rome

_vas vitreum_; Tac. and Tor. _vas citrum_; V. a glass vessel could not be successfully sealed with plaster paris, and the experiment would fail; cf. note 3 to No. 21. [24] TO KEEP MULBERRIES _MORA UT DIU DURENT_ MULBERRIES, IN ORDER TO KEEP THEM, MUST BE LAID INTO THEIR OWN JUICE MIXED WITH NEW WINE [boiled down to one half] IN A GLASS VESSEL AND MUST BE WATCHED ALL THE TIME [so that they do not spoil]. V. This and the foregoing formulæ illustrate the ancients' attempts at preserving foods, and they betray their ignorance of "processing" by heating them in hermetically sealed vessels, the principle of which was not discovered until 1810 by Appert which started the now gigantic industry of canning. [25] TO KEEP POT HERBS [_H_]_OLERA UT DIU SERVENTUR_ PLACE SELECTED POT HERBS, NOT TOO MATURE, IN A PITCHED VESSEL. [26] TO PRESERVE SORREL OR SOUR DOCK _LAPÆ _[1]_ UT DIU SERVENTUR_ TRIM AND CLEAN [the vegetable] PLACE THEM TOGETHER SPRINKLE MYRTLE BERRIES BETWEEN, COVER WITH HONEY AND VINEGAR. ANOTHER WAY: PREPARE MUSTARD HONEY AND VINEGAR ALSO SALT AND COVER THEM WITH THE SAME. [1] The kind of vegetable to be treated here has not been sufficiently identified. List. and G.-V. _rapæ_--turnips--from _rapus_, seldom _rapa_,--a rape, turnip, navew. Tac. and Tor. _Lapæ_ (_lapathum_), kind of sorrel, monk's rhubarb, dock. Tor. explaining at length: _conditura Rumicis quod lapathon Græci, Latini Lapam quoque dicunt_. V. Tor. is correct, or nearly so. Turnips, in the first place, are not in need of any special method of preservation. They keep very well in a cool, well-ventilated place; in fact they would hardly keep very long if treated in the above manner. These directions are better applied to vegetables like dock or monk's rhubarb. Lister, taking Humelbergii word for it, accepts "turnips" as the only truth; but he has little occasion to assail Torinus as he does: _Torinus lapam legit, & nullibi temeritatem suam atque inscientiam magis ostendit._ Now, if Torinus, according to Lister, "nowhere displays more nerve and ignorance" we can well afford to trust Torinus in cases such as this.